The goal of this blog is to help you hold your own in political discussions--especially when the other guy's fighting dirty. Some dirty tricks are obvious, others are subtle. But even when they're blatant it can be hard to know what to say. I'll help. I lean Democrat myself, but I'm as against Democrats using underhanded tactics as I am against Republicans doing so. Fair is fair, and this blog aims to help anyone who shares this belief.

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Something to say to your uncle Harry the gun nut...

If you're a gun owner and want to address this topic, do your side a favor and address the actual laws being considered now in Congress. So don't rant about how you have a constitutional right to bear firearms. You do. OK? Now the issue is what firearms under what circumstances, and what do we do about the issues of bad guys getting their hands on guns. For example, don't you think it's reasonable to have a federal law making it a felony to sell or give a firearm to someone who would fail a background check because he's a felon or a psycho and has been officially judged not to qualify for firearm ownership? After all, it's becoming clear that the average thug with a gun got it from a "straw man" buyer or one of a minority of gun shops that sell guns by the truckload to criminal syndicates and then "lose" the paperwork. Seems to be that the best way to maintain the right of good guys to bear arms is to try much harder to disarm those who have no such right. And the states, by themselves, haven't been able to do it. Modern transportation makes it all to easy to buy a gun in Virginia and take it to D.C. Bottom line: it would allay the fears of the majority of Americans who don't own guns if gun owners would start publicly stating that they agree that the Second Amendment does not confer a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. And that they agree that the Second Amendment supports laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms. And that the government can and should ban the sale to civilians of particularly dangerous and unusual weapons.